GOP Wins On: Ebola and ISIS Fear, Jobs, Taxes, and Dirty Pool

Two-Step Plan

(Even as more Ebola patients get cleared) 

Update on the Dirty Tricks part of this post – maybe even the illegal part. This story (screenshot included below) comes from here:

The GOP is trying to convince Iowa voters via Facebook that their neighbors will know if they voted Republican. Screenshots on Facebook promoted by the official Facebook page of the Republican National Committee feature an ominous message: “NOTICE: All Voting Is Public.”

The RNC Ad tell voters that “In a few months, Iowa will release the list of individual who voted in this election.” Most troubling, the Ad includes an aerial view of a neighborhood with check marks indicating that “These People Voted GOP.”

It is true that voter participation in elections in public information, but how someone voted, including what party they voted for, is not open to the public.

The secret ballot has long been considered a hallmark of American democracy. The Ad is a variation of a GOTV (Get Out The Vote) strategy called “vote shaming.” That tactic is employed by liberals and conservatives to use social psychology to increase the chances that people vote.

In every state but Virginia, whether or not you participated in an election is public. “If you publicize something, it has a very powerful effect on behavior,” Chris Larimer, an Iowa political scientist, told USA Today in 2012.

The Facebook Ads at issue go beyond traditional “vote shaming” by strongly implying that their ballot will not be secret. Two Facebook users who posted screenshots of the ad on social media confirmed to Think Progress that they had seen the Ads on their Facebook news feeds. 

The RNC and the Iowa GOP did not return requests for comments. 

Original Post Starts from Here:

Extract from GOP Playbook: "Culprit Identification Course." 

Short title: "Harsh Message for America, 101."

Chapter 1, Page 1, Lesson 1 Introduction: 

"Ebola will be carried across the Mexican border by ISIS terrorists disguised as IRS agents who previously worked on TEA campaign finance exemptions in Ohio, while focusing on the leader who was born in Kenya where skills in forging Hawaiian birth certificates helped them later on help design death panels for Obama-care after they graduated from the advance course at the Boehner-McConnell school for government managers that also trained interns for the NSA and the CIA under the direct supervision of former student Edward Snowden." 

More here and here, and the most-damaging that the GOP hangs their collective hat on here.

As Rick Perry might say: Oops.

FLASH: This just in ... GOP's "fallback" plan if all else fails — test case here: